Coventry University study shows jumping in the hot tub after a workout could be beneficial to your health

This is an important study for us - it’s the culmination of five to 10 years of work. We’ve run a number of acute short-term studies into the effects of heating which had suggested that there could be some benefits to heating after exercise but this is the first long-term chronic study into the benefit of heat therapy.

Typically, as we get older we do less and less exercise and we increase our risk of cardiovascular disease, so we chose participants in middle age because it’s the perfect time to get the benefits. It could maximise the positive effects of the exercise that people in this group are doing.

We deliberately chose a simple method, using a commercial hot tub and only applying a modest level of heat, because we want this study to be applicable in the real world. We wanted it to be something that normal people might be able to incorporate into their lives to potentially improve their health.

Having the comparison group was a real strength to the study as it means we are able to show that participants experienced additional benefits because of the heating and didn’t simply gain the benefits from just the exercise alone.

We found that heating provided benefits to cardiovascular health by lowering blood pressure and improved endothelial function, which is another important measure of cardiovascular health. While it is important to say all participants experienced benefits to their aerobic fitness, we did not see any additional improvements in aerobic fitness between either group. Equally we didn’t see any difference in inflammatory response.

We don’t fully understand why the heating group experienced these long-term improvements to their blood pressure but it’s something we want to explore with further studies.

Dr Tom Cullen

It is great to see this study published in The Journal of Physiology. This work would not have been possible without a dedicated team of researchers and, most importantly, our amazing volunteers.

Although research into the health benefits of hot water immersion is still in its early stages compared with more established approaches to improving health, our findings suggest that using hot water immersion after a modest bout of exercise can lead to greater reductions in blood pressure than exercise alone in physically inactive middle-aged adults.

These results are particularly important because physically inactive individuals often do not enjoy, or cannot tolerate, the discomfort associated with intense or prolonged exercise. Therefore, using hot water immersion after a short, manageable exercise session may offer a more appealing way to lower blood pressure in those who are unwilling or unable to do enough exercise.

Charles Steward